Giving it a spin to see if it works. What say you, 3.5 readers?
June 4, 2019 – 8:00 P.M. EST (Eastern Standard Time) – Museum of Historic Antiquity – New York City
Ah, the Big Apple. Home to stars of stage and screen, an inspiration to poets and painters alike, and also, at this precise moment, an obese security guard who had spent the past twenty minutes in a dirty bathroom stall, looking at a retro porno mag as he worked on giving birth to the most furious of turds.
“Oh yeah,” Jim said as he unfurled a centerfold inserted in a copy of Bush Fever. “Now that’s quality fur burger. Ergh! Get…out…of me…you beast!”
The fat man’s radio squawked. “Jim…hello? Jim?”
Jim closed the centerfold, then turned a page. He read an article. “Nixon not trustworthy? Hmm…you know, these writers were really onto something.”
Squawk. “Jimbo! Answer your damn radio!”
Jim rolled his eyes and fished around on the floor, where his radio was still attached to his downed pants. He grabbed it and hit the call button. “You rang, Larry?”
Squawk. “Yeah. Where the hell are you, man? You were supposed to do a round a half-hour ago.”
“Larry,” Jim said. “When nature calls, nature calls.”
Squawk. “Nature calls? Jim, you know, nature would call a lot less if you’d take that Pizza Pirate app off your phone.”
“If you know…ugh…another…ergh…company that can deliver a quality Hawaiian pineapple sausage-fest within a thirty-minute window, then I’m all ears.”
Squawk. “Hey, there goes the point, flying right over your head, dipshit. Pinch that loaf and do your round!”
“Ugh,” Jim said. “For twelve bucks an hour, I’m really gonna bust my ass trying to…”
Squawk. “You took the job, dumbass. Now do it.”
“Fine.”
Squawk. “And you’d better not be looking at retro porno mags in there again, Jim.”
Larry scoffed at the very idea. “Lawrence, you have besmirched my honor.”
Squawk. “You know the boss said he’d fire your ass if he ever caught you bringing one of those old timey bush mags to work again. What’s wrong with you? Why don’t you just sneak a peek on your phone like the rest of us?”
“Because Internet porn doesn’t come with the class, the style, the savoir faire of a 1970s era beauty who has grown a lush thicket to hider her femininity, thus delaying access to her rose petal while trapping in the robust scent of…:
Squawk. “Put that shit in your locker and never bring it to work again.”
“Bah,” Jim said. “I’m surrounded by simpletons.”
Squawk. “Seriously, man. In the history of the minimum wage security guard industry, there has never been a laziest guard than you, dude. One of these days, this place is going to be robbed blind and it will be all your fault.”
“Errgh…argh! Ah, there it is. Thank God.”
Jim stood up, his porky face round and sweaty. He set his retro porn mag down on the toilet tank, then hit the call button as he reached for the toilet paper. “Please. The day when a criminal gets one over on old Jim Dunleavy is the day that…”
Jim went cross-eyed as he stopped talking mid-sentence. Like a fully chopped tree, he fell forward, bashing through the stall door and ending up face down on the cold floor. His radio clattered across the room.
Squawk. “Jim?”
A tiny, furry paw raised its way out of the murky, poopy depths of the toilet bowl. It was clutching a used hypodermic needle, the contents of which had been injected into Jim’s backside.
Squawk. “Jimbo, you there?”
The needle was dropped to the floor.
Squawk. “Man, if I have to come find you, I’m gonna be pissed.”
A diminutive capuchin monkey with a mix of white and black fur, barely over a foot tall and weighing no more than four pounds, climbed onto the toilet seat. The tiny fellow shook the brown water from himself, waved the stench away from his face, then unzipped his wetsuit. He removed all of his equipment, including his mask, scuba tank and breathing apparatus. He cast these parts off, uncaring as to where they landed.
He leapt from the pot and landed on the floor. His little feet sailed past the body of his victim. Jim’s eyes were closed, his mouth was agape and a pool of drool was forming.
“Eek,” the monkey said as he put his paws on Jim’s face. The simian intruder had a happy lark, moving the fat man’s face into various positions, giving a smile one moment and a frown the next. He settled on leaving the inept guard with a smile, then skittered towards the door.
“Eek, eek.”
Squawk. “Damn it, Jim, you need to get your ass transferred because if I have to put up with one more night of this shit, I’m going get you fired myself.”
Bookshelf Battle 